By Loren Farrar

Twenty-one point six miles.

Seventeen of them a modern-day old country lane, two carts wide and winding. Music too loud. Top off and windows rolled down, hair clipped back and sunglasses on, because even at eight-thirty in the morning the sun is killing bright on the murder sharp curves.

Thirty-five minute drive, and it's long and not long enough. Monday through Friday. The air is moist and warm now, not crisp like before. But the blacktop lane is still cool from the night.
Moving too fast.

I drive too fast when I'm alone. Curves that shouldn't be twisted around at more than twenty-five mph and I barely tap the brake. Speed's an addiction. Deathdefyinglynecessary. A surge through my blood. It's such a small thing. This need for excitement. In everything I do. Hare-stupid.

And turtles love the damp cool black asphalt this time of day. Journeys of a lifetime start at dawn. They trudge fatalistically forward, the too-too fast vibrations never detouring their onward progress. And, even though highways are for cars, they own this stretch.

Because I dodge.

Swerve and brake. I'll brake for them, even when I won't for those suicide curves. They're easy to miss, wheels straddling the armor clad bumps. Sensing danger, they pull in their chubby legs, their neck-long heads, as shifting air catching them and I watch the shell spin, like a dizzy top, in the rearview mirror as I speed away.

Wheel of Fortune.
Roulette Wheel.
Russian Roulette.

Bite the bullet -like racing around dangerous curves- and I have to wonder: Do turtles crave excitement too? Is this their speed? Adreneline-rush? To know maniacs try to miss them, like a gruesome form of Mole Bash? Xtreme sport for tortoises? Is this a gold medal worthy feat?

Is the race that important? Do they trudge along just to finish? To win?

And where's that rascally rabbit? Now there's Mr. Excitement. Wild. Speed. And a hophop. A frantic pace. You can never get to close before he sprints away. Is it fear, I wonder? Or maybe it's a need to move, to feel, to be free. Not trapped inside a glass box, by underagers who think lettuce is a tasty treat. That's what slow and steady gets you. Maybe turtles don't care, because they spend their whole lives boxed inside those shells.

But rabbits have the world. Their noses twitch, taking it all in. They hide and seek in tuffs of razorsharp grass, ears fine-tuned like antennas, focusing in on movement, and it's a jumpskiphop and they're gone. Who cares about that finish line, why worry about crossing it? Because the destination isn't the important part, right?

And maybe it's just that we all need excitement, exhilaration, a bit of heartbeatingquickbreathing in our everyday?

So the question is turtle-slow, tortoise-steady high? Or hare-fast, rabbit-frantic speed?

Twenty-one point six miles...

Sometimes... yes, sometimes it's the drive and it's the destination.